Four Dam Pool

The Four Dam Pool projects are four hydroelectric facilities (dams and lake tap projects) built by the State of Alaska in the early 1980s in Kodiak, Valdez/Glennallen, Ketchikan, and Wrangell/Petersburg. The State paid for a portion of the dams, and it provided loans through the Power Development Revolving Loan Fund for the remainder of the cost. The total cost for the project in 2007 dollars is estimated at $811 million: $493 million in state funding, and $318 million in grants and loans.¹

Facility Name	Communities Served
Swan Lake	Ketchikan
Tyee	Wrangell and Petersburg
Terror Lake	Kodiak
Solomon Gulch	Valdez and Glennallen

The projects were originally owned by the State of Alaska, Alaska Power Authority, with electricity sold to local utilities through Power Sales Agreements. In January 2002, AIDEA loaned up to $82 million to the utilities to acquire the dams from AEA: $77 million for the dams and up to $5 million to construct an intertie between the Swan Lake hydroelectric project and the Lake Tyee hydroelectric project to move surplus energy from Wrangell/Petersburg to Ketchikan.² The Swan-Tyee Intertie is expected to cost over $100 million when construction is completed in 2009. The Alaska legislature provided for non-payment or forgiveness of a non-current loan owed to the AEA upon closing of the bond sale; this was the outstanding balance of the original loans.³

Footnotes

1. Fay, Ginny, State Funding for Power Cost Equalization and Four-Dam Pool Projects and an Overview of Proposed Railbelt Electrical Intertie Proposals, Alaska State Legislature Research Agency, Research Request 90.142 (revised), December 6, 1989.

2. Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority Revolving Fund, Financial Statements, June 30, 2002, p. 22-23.

3. Alaska Energy Authority, Financial Statements, June 30, 2002, p. 15.